roosseno center
A project for a design competition of an extension of Civil Engineering laboratory facilities at the University of Indonesia.
reconsidering ‘out of place’ elements
Street Vendors as ‘Out of Place’ Urban Elements
Yandi Andri Yatmo
Published in:
Journal of Urban Design Volume 13 No 3 (2008)
Abstract
The existence of street vendors has become a problematic issue in many countries. Despite various arguments that either support or reject their presence in urban environments, street vendors generally have been accused of disrupting the order of the environment and therefore should be removed. The arguments in this paper reconsider the position of street vendors in Indonesian cities, drawing on Mary Douglas’ theory of ‘out of place’. Such a reassessment of street vendors as the ‘out of place’ urban elements offers a theoretical basis for the practice of urban design and planning in dealing with certain unwanted elements.
living on the wall
An alternative concept for housing in the 21st century city
Awarded Kenneth H. Murta Prize, University of Sheffield in 2001 for excellence in design and construction.
This is a project proposal for an alternative concept of living in the 21st century city; responding to issues emerged in relation to the new way of living in the city; exploring the issues of an ‘on-off city’, ‘front-back facades’ and ’sky-ground-surface’ an attempt to ‘light up’ the city centre at night and to revive the back facades.
operations - station to station
A project for a design competition for new train stations at the University of Indonesia.
by the lake
A student canteen for Faculty of Economics, sitting by the beautiful lake at the University of Indonesia campus.
an expression of materials
an expression of building elements
an expression of linearity
responding to site, revealing the truth of building materials and elements, creating boundaries, defining the space inside, extending the space outside
house - body action
House Project [ 2000 ]
A house for an individual in everyday urban life; the exploration of the ‘body action’; the human body as an active body; the same pattern of activities everyday
society needs to know more about environment
The Jakarta Post, 13 December 2007
Opinion and Editorial
Yandi Andri Yatmo and Paramita Atmodiwirjo
Environmental education is a key issue in responding to climate change. There have been countless efforts to spread the awareness of climate change into society. Information is everywhere about global warming and its impacts on our life. However, we cannot simply expect that after knowing the facts on global warming, everybody would voluntarily join environment-friendly attitudes in their everyday life. The question is: Do people really know what they need to know to respond to current environmental issues?
There are two types of knowledge relating to climate change and its relationship to our life. The first type is the knowledge delivered through massive spread of information on the facts of climate change. This is the knowledge we most often find in the media everyday. It tells people on the factual status of our earth, the increasing temperature, the melting of snow and the rising of sea levels, as well as the worrying situation of our forest, water, and wildlife. These are all the facts that are primarily empirical, based on quantitative findings to illustrate the current situation of our environment.
On the other hand, there is another type of knowledge informed to our society as a plea to lead more environment-friendly way of life. Such information usually appears as a series of suggestion to reduce
electricity use, to cycle or walk to work, to reduce the use of plastic, to plant trees, to avoid littering and to manage garbage. Some suggestions are even very extreme, persuading people to turn off the lights in the evening or to completely avoid plastic stuffs and wooden furniture.
These two types of knowledge represent two different aspects of information related to environment. The first type primarily intends to inform the facts, while the second encourage people to act. The first may inform the facts that happen somewhere else — in the arctic, in another country, in the middle of the jungle. The second type suggests some practical things for everyday life. Both types of information have been used for the sake of educating people.
Nevertheless, an important thing to consider in environmental education is how these two types of knowledge are related to one another. It is very important to ensure that people really understand to what extent their acts of planting trees could be related to reducing carbon emission.
This becomes particularly important when environmental education is implemented in basic education levels. It is mandatory that the knowledge on the environment is delivered correctly to our future generation.
So far there are two choices. We may tell them numerical facts of global warming and its impact which currently occur somewhere else, or we may teach them some practical things that they could apply immediately in their own home, school or neighborhood.
Some of the information, especially those related to practical things, is not necessarily new, since they can be found in most primary and secondary school textbooks. Most pupils have known the popular jargon that taught them not to litter (Buanglah sampah pada tempatnya). Textbooks mention a lot about recycling, the difference between organic and inorganic garbage, and the importance of using electricity wisely. Even primary school first-graders have learned about the criteria of a good home environment, which should have enough trees, ventilation, window, rubbish dump and water drainage.
Unfortunately, most often these aspects of environment are taught partially. There were no attempts to encourage the children to think about the connections among different environmental aspects.
Recently we had an opportunity to deliver an environmental education program to primary school children. During one of the sessions we encouraged the children to examine what happened with the rubbish in their school. After they identified the types of garbage produced in their school everyday, we asked them to explain what to do with the garbage. An answer easily came out: “Recycle them”. However, they had no idea when we inquired further what they meant with recycle and how they actually could do it. It illustrates clearly that these children were aware of the term “recycle” without really knowing what it was.
Similarly, most of them did not have the competence in explaining the relationship between “littering” and “flood”, although they knew by heart the phrase “littering causes flood”. The lack of understanding in such simple concept really worried us.
Eventually there would be similar lack of understanding when dealing with more complicated issues, in relating global warming facts with our everyday actions. Children may enjoy joining the acts of planting
trees, but if no further inquiry is taken, they would not understand the important roles of trees to our environment.
We believe that understanding environmental issues and responding to them requires certain level of abilities to think critically. Such critical thinking is necessary to understand the ideas of connections among environmental issues.
After all, environment is about connecting — cause and effects, intervention and impacts, relationship among species, places and matters. There is no point instructing our children to do certain acts, if we do not encourage them to explore the connections. We make a real big mistake if we introduce environmental knowledge to our children simply by pouring out facts, jargons and instructions.
In fact, promoting critical thinking on environmental issues should become the heart of environmental education.
The writers are lecturers of architecture at the University of Indonesia. They actively develop environmental education programs for primary school children with Education Care Unit. They can be contacted at mitayandi@gmail.com.
let city children have their say
The Jakarta Post, 20 October 2007
Opinion
Paramita Atmodiwirjo and Yandi Andri Yatmo, Jakarta
Children are city dwellers, just like adults. They have the right to live a meaningful life within urban environments.
The Child Friendly Cities (Kota Layak Anak) project that has been initiated in several Indonesian cities is an effort by the government to begin to acknowledge the rights of children in cities. Following a pilot project in five cities in 2006, the State Ministry for the Women’s Empowerment is expanding the program to another 10 cities.
A range of different initiatives may be developed to promote children’s rights in cities and give them the opportunity to live in a safe and healthy environment. One may imagine a child-friendly city, where many services and facilities for all children are available, including attention and protection for marginalized and at-risk groups of children.
A child-friendly city is a place where all children have easy access to housing, health and education. It is also the place where children can happily enjoy green and unpolluted playgrounds and a safe walk to and from school.
However, the concept of Child Friendly Cities requires much more than just the physical development of the urban environment. An important aspect in this concept is the need to promote children as active agents in their environment. This implies the active involvement of children in deciding about what happen to places where they live. This is also clearly stated in the definition of child-friendly cities, which should fulfill the rights of children to “influence decisions about their city” and “express their opinion on the city they want”.
Giving opportunities to children to have a say about their life is quite a challenge in our culture. We have been culturally educated for so long that “children are to be seen and not heard”. Thus most decisions in our society are made by the adults. Within families, schools and communities, we are used to the situation where children are only passive participants, merely following the programs or activities planned by adults.
The spirit of child-friendly cities in giving children a say also suggests how our society should change its attitudes toward children. We should begin to realize that our children possess potentials that should not be ignored. And they have the ability to express their ideas and opinions on matters that we normally consider as adult business.
A number of projects in many countries have proven the successful involvement of children in making decisions about various aspects of urban life. In London, for example, a commission worked on a project involving young Londoners in the strategy development process of the Great London Authority. A forum called Munchner Kinder and Jugendforum was established in Munich to allow children and teenagers to have a say in the planning process of their city.
There are even more attempts to involve children at more micro levels. For example, children might be asked to give opinions about public transportation, to design their own school or to participate in the revitalization of a neighborhood park.
The involvement of children in making decisions about their cities brings together a range of educational values. It helps empower the children to become active citizens. It also enhances their sense of belonging to their environment. If our cities currently have so many problems, we must try our best to educate the next generation who will eventually lead our cities.
For some time, we have organized a series of workshops for primary schoolchildren. We asked the children to imagine the future of the city where they now live, and together we built a 3D model based on their ideas.
We found that this exercise is a powerful vehicle to involve children in the planning process and to give them some freedom to express their opinion. It is a way to develop their imagination and creativity about their environment, while at the same time teaching responsibility, awareness and sensitivity to what happens in their surroundings. It also provides opportunities for the children to learn about collaboration, and the importance of working together to make our environment better.
The involvement of children in the process of planning, developing and managing our cities should be at the heart of all efforts to realize child-friendly cities. The provision of physical facilities and services may have more direct effects in fulfilling the children’s short-term basic needs, but promoting their active involvement will be a more valuable investment for the future of our cities.
So, have we already asked the children what they want? Perhaps it is a question that we all need to address before embarking into any development programs for our urban children.
The writers, lecturers of architecture at the University of Indonesia, develop environmental education programs for primary schoolchildren with the Education Care Unit. They can be contacted at mitayandi@gmail.com
sometimes our best laid urban plans could do with some chaos
The Jakarta Post, 30 July 2007
Opinion and Editorial
Yandi Andri Yatmo, Jakarta
Our cities have failed to cater to the needs of residents. Regardless of never-ending efforts at physical development in urban areas, issues of disorder and chaos keep emerging in many cities. Conflicts between the haves and the have-nots are evident in most urban areas where physical development takes place.
The construction of public buildings may create happiness for some parts of society, but such new development is usually followed by further problems — the poor losing their space and opportunities for earning money, the new development cutting off access and shelter for some people and the new buildings taking up green areas.
Some attempts at urban development have tried hard to meet the needs for city inhabitants, but often the services provided are not utilized as intended. Pedestrian paths are built with nobody walking on them, open spaces are provided where no one wants to come and play, and street vendors are provided with spaces for trading where there are no ways to attract customers. Meanwhile children are content playing in dangerous places, people feel happy walking on busy streets with no pedestrian paths and street vendors keep trading in illegal spots.
The long unsolved issues of our urban environments might be best defined as an outcome of what I call “”mismatch policy””. “”Mismatch”” occurs when there is a discrepancy between two or more things. In this case, the mismatch occurs between the ideal vision of an urban environment created by urban elites and the reality of everyday life for most city dwellers.
An ideal urban environment is something that everybody may dream of. It is normal for humans to aim for perfect and harmonious surroundings. In the context of the urban environment, this ideal vision is often translated into efforts to create an orderly environment, with everything in its place. The planning of cities is conducted mostly by architects and planners, in an attempt to create orderly environments that are neat, tidy and pleasant for the eye.
But efforts to achieve such an ideal will very likely be shattered by the reality of urban life. The dynamic reality of urban life is very much different from the ideal vision of a harmonious and orderly environment. The everyday reality of our cities always contains a lot of conflicts, contradictions, disorderliness and unpredictability, which is contrary to the orderly plan as imagined by planners.
The phenomenon of street vendors everywhere in cities is a clear example of how it is hardly possible to maintain a place as orderly as planned. In fact, such a phenomenon may represent the real everyday pattern of our cities.
I believe it is time for us to realize that there is a serious mismatch between the ideal vision of the elites and the reality of life as experienced by most urban inhabitants. This mismatch is very likely to happen when the elites keep being distanced from everyday life.
Planners and designers tend to translate their ideal vision of an urban environment into nice plans that look good on paper, thus showing our cities from the top. But no one ever views our cities that way except when flying. Similarly, beautifully rendered 3-D models show nice and orderly environments as imagined by the planners. Such images are transformed and filled with disorder and unexpected things once the space is utilized by people.
The mismatch between ideal vision and reality is much related to the education of those entering the planning and design profession. There has been a tendency to educate students to create the built environment as an “”I want”” or an “”I think”” ideal. This has led to a utopian approach that only solves the issues on the surface.
What is lacking from this kind of education is the encouragement to explore deeply who we are, what is so special about us and what makes us different. That is the only way to fully understand the reality of urban life, which may differ from one location to another. The ideal should not be taken as a universal value that ignores everyday, local characteristics.
The emphasis on the materiality of the built environment has also brought the tendency for visual beauty, or how an environment should look good to the eye. In fact, often the real meaning of beauty lies in the experience when we can mingle with our neighbors, enjoy various activities, looking at and talking to one another. It is the real beauty that can be experienced through all the senses. When such simple and trivial things from our everyday life are not considered during the planning process, very likely mismatch will occur.
A good policy regarding the planning and design of urban environments would take into account the unexpected aspects of everyday life, including disorder. The vision of an ideal environment is always open to question. In fact, we need some disorder, or surprises and unexpected things, to live a happy and dynamic life in cities. And it is very important that any planning policies take into account those unexpected aspects, without being too preoccupied with the ideal visions of perfect and beautiful environments.
The writer is an architect and lecturer at the University of Indonesia. He can be reached at yandiay@yahoo.co.uk.
learning outside
Let’s Go Out and Learn
Paramita Atmodiwirjo & Yandi Andri Yatmo
Published in:
Contemporary Issues in Education
David Seth Preston (Ed)
Rodopi, NL, 2005
